“The Stranger” by Albert Camus

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Brief Plot Overview
The Novel Analysis
Conclusion
References

Introduction

The Stranger is considered to be a novel written by Albert Camus in 1942. This work is regarded to be the embodiment of philosophical concepts developed in the previous century. Many scholars refer the novel to existentialism direction, though the author never considered himself the representative of this branch. It is necessary to underline the fact that The Stranger depicts the author’s world perception, who treated it as indifferent and absurd. Nevertheless, Albert Camus managed to show the narrator’s attempts to rebel against personal indifference to obtain the best human values and virtues.

Brief Plot Overview

The Stranger is dedicated to the story of Meursault, a Frenchman and a story protagonist, who is characterized as an innately passive and emotionally detached person. His killing of an Arab man is perceived as a burst of irrational action. The investigation carried out by the police, led to Meursault’s execution for his disability to express proper feelings for the character’s dead mother, but not for the murder he committed. It is necessary to underline the fact that the novel is logically divided into two parts, one of which tells the story before the murder, and the other reflects Meursault’s life after his crime.

The Novel Analysis

The Stranger appeared to be a successful philosophical masterpiece, bringing numerous criticism and responses on the part of scholars. The central concept of the novel is dedicated to the symbolization of ‘absurd’ as the key element accompanying a person’s life and impacting the formation of human behavior and actions in society. Camus demonstrates the idea that human existence is not evaluated through its rational meaning. Nevertheless, the difficulties connected with this author’s concept identification make people unintentionally create artificial rational structures, providing a sense for their lives. The Stranger allows the readers to evaluate the concept of ‘absurdity’ on the example of the narrator’s style of life and behavior.

Irrationality is symbolized throughout the whole novel; it characterizes Meursault’s connection with the internal and external world. Unreasonable thoughts and decisions made by the protagonist, such as marriage and crime, can not be characterized as rational.

‘For the first time maybe, I really thought I was going to get married’ (Camus and Stuart, 50)

It is necessary to underline the idea that the author strived to make the readers think of their mortality and life meaning. Analyzing the characters’ behavior one can stress the idea, that people live in constant search for the meaning of existence and actions, but very often we forget, that there is nothing to be searched for in reality. All the actions are treated as unreasonable making Meursault be a stranger among others. (Shoham, 54)

The Stranger is a novel translated from French, having several translated copies with considerable differences in interpretations. Thus, very often the novel is translated as ‘outsider’, identifying the character as the one, living outside the society. This idea is different from the one, which the author strives to demonstrate. Meursault is a symbolic representative of irrational evil, living in the society and feeling its pressure in search of meaning. Nevertheless, the second part of the novel is dedicated to social absurd embodiment through the trial and attempts to find the meaning in Meursault’s actions. (Kaplan, and Skolnick, 39)

One more aspect analyzed in the novel is dedicated to the importance of the physical environment. The Stranger cannot be called emotional or expressive, because its protagonist discloses no feelings or worrying about emotional life aspects. All the relationships the character has with Marie and her family is based on physical satisfaction, rather than moral happiness. For example, the case of his mother’s death is not so oppressive for Meursault, as funeral procession heat, causing physical inconvenience; the same reason appeared to be the key motivation for Arab killing, caused by character’s sufferings under the sunlight.

‘Maman died today. Or yesterday maybe, I don’t know. I got a telegram from the home: ‘Mother deceased. Funeral tomorrow. Faithfully yours.’ That doesn’t mean anything. Maybe it was yesterday.’ (Camus and Stuart, 3)

One of the central novel motifs is observation, showing how people live in a state of constant watching each other’s actions and behavior. The evaluation of absurdity and meaningless is reached through social observation centralized in the story. For example, the physical inconvenience of the character is caused by the sun watching, and Meursault’s execution is the result of the jury observation. The idea of depicting human life in search of meaning is based on the concept of watching and analyzing external and internal human activities. (Morris, 117)

Conclusion

The Stranger can be analyzed as a valuable contribution to philosophical thought development through Camus’ successful presentation of human life in the modern world. The central idea depicted by the author gives an opportunity to understand absurdity of our meaning search, instead of creating the meaning with our hands. It is necessary to stress the point that the novel can be regarded as real masterpiece to be read by the students for the purpose of watching their order of life and balancing physical and moral values.

References

Camus, Albert and Stuart, Gilbert. The Stranger. Vintage Books, 1954.

Kaplan, John and Skolnick, Jerome. Criminal justice: introductory cases and materials. Foundation Press, 1982.

Morris, Donald. Opportunity: optimizing life’s chances. Prometheus Books, 2006.

Shoham, Giora. Society and the absurd: a sociology of conflicting encounters. Sussex Academic Press, 2006.

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“The Stranger” by Albert Camus

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